


Lumenaria is Falling

by Fabulous_Fan_Fables



Category: Keeper of the Lost Cities Series - Shannon Messenger
Genre: Amputation, Angst, Blood and Injury, Broken Bones, Canon Compliant, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Dissociation, Fear of Death, Gen, Loss of Limbs, Major Character Injury, Minor Character Death, Missing Scene, Pain, Panic, Suffering, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-01
Updated: 2020-12-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:21:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27828172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fabulous_Fan_Fables/pseuds/Fabulous_Fan_Fables
Summary: Lumenaria is falling, and Terik is trapped inside.Story featuring Talentless!Terik
Comments: 6
Kudos: 12





	Lumenaria is Falling

**Author's Note:**

> Read tags for trigger warnings, stay safe while reading this!

Lumenaria is falling. There is a tremble in the walls and a rustling of the furniture.

Lumenaria is falling. Everyone is screaming, everyone is panicking. 

He splits off from the rest, as he isn’t as fast or agile as them. He calls for the councillors to help him out, but his shouts are muffled by the noise. The scene is busy and chaotic. Violent tremors in the structure and falling debris clouded his perception of reality, and he stumbled through the halls, trying to keep up with the other officials trying to escape.   
  
The noise squirms into his ears, and he feels a strong fit of dissociation try to take over him. It’s all too overwhelming, and fear had taken root where he usually kept his confidence. Panic is making his chest hurt, and he constantly has to blink out the dust. He sees a councillor conjure away a chunk of the falling ceiling, and he feels empty knowing he could do nothing to help.   
  
He is without a talent, a secret he has kept for many many years. And even the talent he made up so he would have a seat on the council was utterly useless in the face of all this chaos. He sees a support beam nearly fall into a councillor, Emery, he notes, but a goblin bodyguard leapt into the path, getting stuck down into a pile on the floor. Emery hesitates but leaves the fallen guard behind, fleeing with the others.    
  
Thankfully, Terik had a kinder heart, getting to his knees beside them. He lifts the support beam with a heave. The goblin looks at him wearily, and Terik can see the life start to leave their eyes. “My wife, Mayzel, tell her that I’m sorry, and I love her.” They gasped, blood spilling from their mouth and dripping onto the floor.    
  
“Oh fuck- yeah, I will.” Terik stammers, stumbling back as another violent shock wave slashed through the building. The ground beneath the dying goblin gave way, and Terik watched as they were crushed and torn apart as they fell through the ground into the rooms below. Knowing that would be his fate soon, and that that memory wouldn’t possibly leave his mind, Terik got to his feet and made for the exit.    
  
He tried to use his natural-born telekinesis to keep the shrapnel and debris away, but he hadn’t kept the skill as refined as he should have, and he missed a chunk hurling towards him. He was struck in the left shoulder, sent spiralling into the wall. “Help!” He screamed, getting showered with more small chunks of shrapnel, fighting to get back up and out of the danger zone.   
  
He tried calling for help again, but the scream turned real as a large piece of lumenite fell onto his leg. He heard bones snap and crunch under the weight of the piece of rubble. “Help! Oh my god, I am going to die!” He shouted into the crumbling castle, wriggling helplessly as the weight on his leg increased.    
  
“No, no no no-” he stammered, pushing desperately in an attempt to free his leg, all his nerves on fire as it pressed down harder, more unsettling crunching shooting through his veins. Suddenly, without a warning to prepare, another chunk of ceiling fell onto the lumenite, and his leg was ripped off. 

Terik was against one of the walls, most of the inner floor collapsed through, including a good chunk his left leg had been resting on. For a terrifying second, he thought he was dead, but then a horrible pain shot through his body, and he screamed, the sound choking off into shuddering sobs and whimpers. 

He drifted in and out of consciousness, vision blurry, and limp against the wall. He felt every tremor of the castle, and small gasps escaped him as he was jostled. He looked over at his leg, only seeing red. Blood, he realized numbly, his blood. He tried to swing his leg, or whatever was left of it, but nothing responded to his commands. He just felt a horribly vacant burn, so he stopped trying.    
  
He felt so alone. So cold, so lost. Had nobody heard his screaming? Was he truly alone? Would he die, here on the uncomfortable ground, the castle, the peace submit, collapsing around him? His mind was all too aware of every rumble and distant crash. He noted that death was close, too close, and it was all too likely he’d drift away right here. Right here, he would die.    
  
A resolve settled in his heart, and he closed his eyes, ignoring the terrifying shockwave that spiralled through the walls and ceiling. Suddenly, he heard a familiar voice fill his mind.  _ Terik, Terik, are you safe?  _ It was Emery, he realized quickly, the wise and powerful telepath on the council.   
  
_ Dying, I’m dying Em.  _ Terik answers, a shudder shooting through his body when he realized Emery would witness his life leaving him.  _  
_

_ Not on my watch, stay awake, I’m finding you.  _ He can hear the stubbornness in his inner voice, and his resolve to rescue him. _  
_   
_ You won’t find me in time, the ground is going to give way. _ Even as he answered the thoughts, he saw the ground crack begin to crumble further, and his body was jostled and slid towards the gaping cavern in the ground. _  
_   
_ That’s quitter talk, Ter. I got you.  _ Terik wondered if the inevitable fall and crash would kill him, or if he’d be a broken pile of bones on the bottom, slowing down until he breathed his last, shuddering breath. He wondered if Emery could sense he was becoming weaker and weaker at every rumble and shockwave. Slowly, yet surely, fading. He felt himself grow dizzier and dizzier as more time passed, his mind slowing down along with his pulse.    
  
_ “Aha!”  _ He both heard and felt the exclamation, the sound being in both his mind and surroundings, causing him to wince. In his peripherals, he saw Emery come closer, his form crumpled and dirty. He saw red staining his torso, and Terik hoped he’d make it out okay, without him. Emery cursed upon seeing the dying councillor’s condition, then Terik felt lightless as he was lifted with telekinesis. He relaxed a tad, closing his eyes and putting his full trust in the taller councillor, slowly drifting away into his mind. 

“Almost there, almost there.” Emery panted, breathing ragged. He coughed, and stumbled, and yelped as loose debris rained down on him. He managed to keep Terik relatively safe as they exited the crumbling castle. His telekinetic hold on Terik never faltered, and Terik felt the true extent of the power Emery carried. 

He was settled onto coarse sand, and pandemonium erupted. He zoned out, focusing on breathing, since he was safe now, he’d be okay. He didn’t know what else happened that day, not caring to stay in the loop. A determined pair of physicians stayed with him, only occasionally leaving to give aid to others. Long into the night, he lay on that beach, hearing the waves, hearing the shouts. 

He understood pretty quickly that he would lose his leg if that wasn’t too obvious by now. He felt upset at the revelation, but he would take that over dying any day. 

  
But even then, several days later, as he lay in the healing center, staring at the stump the disaster had left him with, he cried.  
  
  
No one knew what to do to comfort him, except promise a worthy replacement for what he lost.    
  
  
When he was in stable enough condition, he attended the goblin’s presentation.   
  
  



End file.
